Sunday, September 12, 2010

i know, it's been MONTHS since i posted. i apologize. the dual time sinks of plurk & facebook have just KILLED my will to post. however, i'm going to TRY to change that.

however, don't expect nearly so much knitting content.

yes, i am still knitting like a mad woman (will probably NEVER stop). however, a lot of what i'm doing is simple st ockinette socks for A4A, and no matter what pretty color they may or may not be, there's only so much "here's another finished pair of socks" posts i can put up before people start unsubscribing in droves (if they haven't already!)

however, i did want to discuss another of my loves. food.

as many of you may know, for a year i was the food columnist at the daily chum. once a week i would wax eloquent on the joys and loves (and yes, even the disasters and sorrows) o f food & cooking. the chum ended about a year ago, and i find myself missing writing about food. the hard part for me was having a schedule. i HAD to have a column written every week (mostly my own pressure, b ut you know how that goes, you're your own worst critic bla b la bla), and i got to the point where i didn't love it so much.

so, here's what i propose. i'll write about food. i'll write about what i'm doing, and what i'm thinking and, of course, what i'm eating. lemme know if you get sick of it.

tonight? shrimp. i just had a friend on plurk tell me that she had the most flavorless meal, and it involved shrimp. i have to say, where seafood comes in, i think my all-time favorite is shrimp. i like lobster, and crab, and most salt-water fish (and even a few fresh water, who knew tilapia (geshundeit) was a fresh-water fish?), but my #1 love is shrimp. there are some TERRIBLE crimes done to shrimp, though. it's easy to over cook (anything that takes 3 MINUTES to cook will do that to ya), it has a subtle flavor that can be masked by too much spice, or other strong tasting foods, and it's just easy to fuck up. i think the #1 crime is boiling it. to me, cold boiled shrimp is akin to eating mock krab. it's ok, and it's in the right direction, but it's kinda drab. it's part of why i don't like shrimp cocktail. while i LOVE a good cocktail sauce, it should be reserved for fried shrimp, which are intensified by the frying process, and the horseradish tends to cut the richness of the fried breading. i think cold shrimp should go with lighter flavors, like a mild remoulade, or even a pina colada sauce like Red Lobster does with their coconut shrimp.

M has been on a smoked meats kick for a month, and recently smoked some shrimp. they were good, but there were 2 problems. 1) they were dry, because he shelled them. he'd gotten to them before i knew it, and lickety split, they were nekkid. 2) the smoke overpowered any shrimp taste, so most of what i got was the seasoning he put on them (he did 2 batches, one lemon garlic and the other cajun), and, of course, smoke. A better choice would have been to smoke them in the shell, which would have preserved the moisture, and screened out some of the smoke, and gone with a milder seasoning in the cajun batch. now mind, i like spicy shriimp, but this was too much in combo with the smoke.

my favorite preparation? sauteed in olive oil/butter mix with garlic. it intensifies the shrimp flavor (you're boiling the internal water OFF the shrimp), and infuses it with the loveliness that is/can be garlic. i like shrimp scampi, especially if it's done well (Red Lobster's is too salty for me, how many times have they boiled that butter?!?).

One quetion for you, dear reader: Do you eat the tails?

Here's my answer: Yes & no. If the shrimp is hot, and either fried or grilled, the tails can crisp up rather nicely, and add a nice texture to the dish (be wary though, i had a friend who got stuck in the gum with the sharp point of a shrimp tail and ended up allergic!) however, NEVER in a cold dish, and NEVER straight out of a bag of cooked shrimp. i have to pat those puppies dry, and hide their sometimes off flavors with coctail sauce.